Word study

Select

5 Hebrew words behind this English word

The original-language words that the Berean Standard Bible translates with one of these: selected, select, selects. English often uses one word where Hebrew or Greek has several, each with its own shade of meaning. Under each word are verses where it is translated this way; choose the word itself for its full study: every verse, how else it is translated, the forms it takes and what the dictionaries say.

At a glance

How often each original word is translated “select” or one of its forms.

Compare the Hebrew words side by side

Hebrew and Aramaic words (Old Testament)

  • לָכַד lâkadcapture, seize, take (by lot)translated this way 12 times of its 120 uses · Strong’s H3920Verb  ·  Translated: captured 62, capture 12, selected 9, caught 8

    Joshua 7:14 In the morning you must present yourselves tribe by tribe. The tribe that the LORD selects shall come forward clan by clan, and the clan that the LORD selects shall come forward family by family, and the family that the LORD selects shall come forward man by man.

    1 Samuel 10:20 Thus Samuel had all the tribes of Israel come forward, and the tribe of Benjamin was selected.

    Full study and all 112 verses →
  • לָקַח lâqachtaketranslated this way 8 times of its 938 uses · Strong’s H3947Verb  ·  Translated: take 247, took 245, taken 40, get 26

    Genesis 18:7 Meanwhile, Abraham ran to the herd, selected a tender and choice calf, and gave it to a servant, who hurried to prepare it.

    Exodus 12:3 Tell the whole congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man must select a lamb for his family, one per household.

    Full study and all 890 verses →
  • בָּחַר bâcharchoosetranslated this way 7 times of its 171 uses · Strong’s H977Verb  ·  Translated: chosen 73, choose 44, chose 21, chooses 6

    Judges 20:15 On that day the Benjamites mobilized 26,000 swordsmen from their cities, in addition to the 700 select men of Gibeah.

    1 Samuel 2:28 And out of all the tribes of Israel I selected your father to be My priest, to offer sacrifices on My altar, to burn incense, and to wear an ephod in My presence. I also gave to the house of your father all the food offerings of the Israelites.

    Full study and all 163 verses →
  • רָאָה rââhseetranslated this way 3 times of its 1,266 uses · Strong’s H7200Verb  ·  Translated: see 354, saw 285, seen 124, look 45Full study and all 1,181 verses →
  • נָתַן nâthangive, put, settranslated this way 2 times of its 1,957 uses · Strong’s H5414Verb  ·  Translated: give 326, gave 206, given 187, put 135

    Exodus 31:6 Moreover, I have selected Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan, as his assistant. I have also given skill to all the craftsmen, that they may fashion all that I have commanded you:

    Full study and all 1,785 verses →
How to study a word well
  1. Start from the verse, not the dictionary. Find which Hebrew or Greek word stands in the verse you are studying. One English word often translates several different original words.
  2. Read every place the word is used. A word means what its writers used it to mean. The list of verses and the count by book show its range, and who uses it most.
  3. Look at how it is translated. A word rendered five different ways has a wider meaning than any one English word can carry.
  4. Notice the form. A command is not a statement, and a passive verb is something done to the subject. The form in your verse is part of the meaning.
  5. See what it keeps company with. The words that appear beside it again and again show how the Bible itself connects ideas.
  6. Then read the dictionaries. They give the considered view of scholars, with their evidence.
  7. Come back to the verse. Context decides. A word does not carry every one of its meanings into every verse, and where a word came from does not settle what it means in a sentence written centuries later.

Scripture text and translation counts: Berean Standard Bible. Full entry: Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906, public domain), in the digital edition Brown-Driver-Briggs Enhanced by unfoldingWord (Joel Ruark, J. de Joode), based on data by Eliran Wong and Stephen Ku; its additions are used under CC BY 4.0. Strong’s Hebrew Dictionary: Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible Project, CC BY 4.0. Hebrew-to-English verse numbering: original work of the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible available at https://github.com/openscriptures/morphhb, CC BY 4.0. We reformatted the data, linked the references to this site’s Bible text and left out words in other scripts that the source holds only as images. These are historical reference works; an entry gives its authors’ view, and a word’s meaning in any verse depends on how it is used there.